Pen doodle of Chara from Undertale that I decided to finish digitally.

#undertale#pen#traditional#mixed media#fanart#digital

Scanned Image Raw

I drew this in my tiny memo pad, so I need all the detail I could get! This is what the drawing looks like scanned at 600 dpi without any editing.

Scanned Image Edit

Color correction and some minor edits to the actual drawing. I haven't quite decided on a color palette yet, but I decided to go ahead and make the doodle to some sort of brown. Initially, I duplicated the image, Gaussian Blurred it, then turned down the opacity for a softer look, but I decided that I didn't want to lose the texture of the original scan. Finally, I overlayed some blacks and whites with a soft brush, which brought out the texture some more. Added a shot of my layer stack so you can kinda see what went on.

Base Colors

I laid down some colors, trying to go for a sephia-ish look with hints of color. After I was done, the palette seemed too dark...oh well. That's what tweaking is for!

Painting

Started painting over the original pen drawing. Chara is something of an untouchable figment of the past, so I went for a light-shining-from-the-heavens glow. Kinda reminds me of the Judgement Hall from the end of the game, haha.

Painting 2

I wanted to give the colors an extra omph, so I broke out the desaturated/grey shades! You know the whole "if you paint with warm colors you should shade with cool colors and vice versa" thing? Cool doesn't necessarily mean green, blue, and purple. Amid all these warm colors, the greyish colors I added look almost like a pale blue.

Final Piece

I wanted to make Chara pop out more, so I slapped on a dark gradient starting from the bottom of the image, then erased the parts that I wanted to remain bright (Chara, background flowers, the vines, words, and the slash). I also decided to bring back the Gaussian Blur! The eye is drawn to areas of detail, so I erased out the parts I mentioned earlier as well for extra focus. Undertale likes to break the fourth wall, so I felt it was important to show the slash chopping into the stalagmite/stalactite image border. And that's it!

Ahh I love how everything pops in the final piece. The framing elements, pen texture, and colors give it a really cool old tarot card kind of feeling. This makes me want to try doodling with ballpoint pens again.

Gosh, sorry for the super delayed response, everyone! ^^;
rincs Thank you! I was initially a bit scared I'd ruin the picture after adding color, but I'm happy with the way it turned out, too :'D
ange-la-ange Haha, it's definitely not a conventional art tool, but I love drawing with them anyways. Maybe I should actually try drawing tarot cards someday? owo
thecapturedspy Thank you! Gradients can really make a world of difference, haha. ^^